Nuts to the nanny state
Tuesday, August 5, 2008 Driving to Bournemouth yesterday I listened as callers to Five Live responded to criticism of "lads mags" such as Zoo and Nuts. The source of the attack was shadow cabinet member Michael Gove, "a leading Tory moderniser" and a man I have a lot of time for. According to a Press Association report, Gove was due to give a speech in which he would say:
"I believe we need to ask tough questions about the instant-hit hedonism celebrated by the modern men's magazines targeted at younger males. Title such as Nuts and Zoo ... reinforce a very narrow conception of beauty and a shallow approach towards women ...
"They celebrate thrill-seeking and instant gratification without ever allowing any thought of responsibility towards others, or commitment to intrude. The contrast with the work done by women's magazines, and their publishers, to address their readers in a mature and responsible fashion, is striking.
"We should ask those who make profits out of revelling in, or encouraging, selfish irresponsibility among young men, what they think they're doing. The relationship between these titles and their readers is a relationship in which the rest of us have an interest.
I have never read Nuts or Zoo, but for heaven's sake! I expect to hear this sort of hand-wringing, interfering nonsense from Harriet Harman, not "liberal" progressive Tories like Michael Gove. How long before another MP calls for these and other titles to be banned from display and kept "under the counter".
Gove's comments appeared in a speech to the Institute for Public Policy Research, an influential New Labour think-tank - which may explain if not justify them. In it he spelled out how the Conservatives will implement a form of "liberal paternalism" - shaping rather than dictating personal behaviour.
Politically, "liberal paternalism" makes a lot of sense for the Conservatives because there has always been a strong paternalist tradition within the Tory party, and the policy will also win the support of many who voted for New Labour but don't have a strong allegiance to the Labour party - but I can't help feeling that "liberal paternalism" is just a diluted, rebranded version of the nanny state.
I call it nanny state lite - coming soon to a manifesto near you.
Reader Comments (8)
I can see his point. Oh yes. I think he definitely has a point. BUT, whereas before the smoking ban came in I would have just thought it a fairly benign comment, I also take such comments now as the first hint of yet another aspect of The New Puritanism about to swing into force. I heard somewhere recently that smoking bans originally emerged from a moralistic perspective, rather than a health perspective - and the speaker suggested that they still do. That they are merely 'cloaked' in health terms, but that it is the uber-moralisers who are really behind such movements. Given the 'cult-like' feeling of the anti-smoking movement, there certainly does seem to me to be a religious and moralistic basis to it - and it would not surprise me if erotica proved to be part of that same agenda.
Perhaps we are to return to Victorian times, when those things deemed 'unsavoury' by the Middle Class passed secretly through the hands of only the upper and lower classes, leaving the 'pure' Middle Class out of the loop.
As for 'Liberal Paternalism' - my guess is that Blair's Babes objected to the word 'Nanny' on the grounds that it's offensive to women. But, of course, they are the same. (I should probably add to that, in case there's any doubt, that I am female, and prefer the word 'Nanny' because I find it more suitably scary).
Here's a revolutionary idea that could render the 'under the counter' movement null and void - how about encouraging publishers to produce ALTERNATIVE magazines, that prove so brilliantly informative and enjoyable that young men CHOOSE to buy those ones, and end up spending more time with them than the 'quick thrill' variety. Can you imagine? Choice?!! Maturity! Who'd've thunk such a thing was possible in these backward days of the 21st century.
"We should ask those who make profits out of revelling in, or encouraging, selfish irresponsibility among young men, what they think they're doing."
They probably think they're selling magazines, providing none of the content is illegal they're entitled to tell this MP to bog off as we all should do. MPs have no business sticking their nose into this. In this day and age, sticking their nose is a prelude to legislation and we're talking freedom of speech here - one of our most sacred rights.
I'd much prefer a coherent energy policy, and while we're at it, 'libertarian (or liberal) paternalism' is an absolute oxymoron.
Any politician suggesting such a risible position should be asked if he knows any communist tories.
Whenever I hear the term 'paternalism', I think of the 'benevolent paternalism' of those Victorian factory owners (often Quakers, I believe) who built villages in which to house their workers and made it a condition of employment (and housing) that the workers adopt their values into their lifestyles (eg, teetotalism).
These philanthropists did much to lift many out of grinding poverty and perhaps the poor accepted the social engineering as a small price to pay.
It's highly debatable whether people today would feel such gratitude, especially in view of the dismantling of 'deference'.
I'd prefer it, myself, if politicians would take their paternalism, 'liberal' or otherwise and lay it to rest, then get on with governing the country rather than me.
Simon -
I really don't understand your surprise at Michael Gove's cringe-making comments - especially since half the 'men' in the Conservative Party seem to be on an oestrogen drip (or should that be 'trip' ?) these days !
And it's the Tory 'modernisers' (especially the soi-disant 'liberals') that we have most to fear from, surely ?
Beginning (at least) with Ted Heath, it was the 'modernisers' who - inter alia - destroyed the integrity of many of our ancient counties ('inefficient'), connived at the destruction of hundreds of grammar schools ('unfair'), pushed for our absorption into the European Superstate ('inevitable'), ripped the historic heart out of many of our towns ('progress'), and drove hundreds of thousands from the streets and neighbourhoods they had grown up in - only to be 're-located' in soul-less estates and brutalist tower blocks ('homes for the future').
God save us from THAT sort of 'progress' !
Oh yes, and wasn't Mr Gove one of those 40-odd creepy Tory Quislings who voted FOR the Ban ?
Yes, I rather think he was...................
Blimey - you could've knocked me over with a steamroller !
I think this is a difficult one, Simon. I don't want to see these magazines banned ... As a sex therapist, I'm all in favour of getting healthy, sex-positive messages out there.
But really folks, have you tried reading these things? They are sooooo depressing ... and it is worrying to think that so many young men are getting their sex and relationship messages from junk such as these.
Rose -
It's not just the 'young men' who are receiving (or transmitting) distorted messages - as any ten minute stroll through the Internet will reveal (or so I'm reliably informed by my team of 'researchers') !
That's true enough Martin! Apart from the relationship angle, the young men I see who are now effectively "brought up" on this stuff have entirely unrealistic ideas about what men's and women's bodies SHOULD look like, normal sexual performance etc